Skill Tree Revamp

Captain's Blog Stardate 93737.82

It looks like Cryptic has decided to revamp the skill system again. This is either the 2nd or 3rd time they'll be revamping it. This revamp is designed to simplify the skill tree and make it easier for players to understand what skills do and how they interact with everything else in the game. I won't get into too many details (since the official blog does that) but I do want to review a few points.

The first thing that I like is that we will not be earning small amounts of Skill Points as we level up. Levelling will now require Expertise Points. Once you level up, you'll earn Space and Ground Skill Points. I think this is a much better approach. Previously you needed to add points to skills slowly as you gained additional experience which made it difficult to plan ahead. At least this way you can decide what skills to put points into per level.

Some of the previous skills are getting combined while others are becoming unlockables. This seems to slim down the skill tree in an attempt to make it easier to understand and beneficial to players. I think we need to learn more about this and actually see the skills in order to full understand it. The concept seems interesting, but I do feel a bit uneasy about it. Perhaps because this will greatly change a lot of players' builds.

To be honest, I need more details before I can say if this sounds like a good or bad idea. I look forward to testing this on Tribble and urge everyone else to do so. The more people who test it and provide feedback to Cryptic the fewer bugs we'll have and the better this system will be. Don't wait until it's released to Holodeck and then complain about the bugs! I'll be sure to write a blog after it his Tribble and played around with it.

I just want to let you know that my skill planner will reflect all these new changes. I guarantee you'll be happy. Now go ahead and share your thoughts about the upcoming skill tree revamp! :)

Written by Attilio on February 19, 2016 at 10:33 am

Comments

Kenthend(Member) said...February 19, 2016 at 03:00 pm

I am looking forward to this change. I wasn't around for the 1st two revamps so I only know the way we have now. It looks like a positive change. What I hope for is that they give us a couple of re respecs so we can choose what's best for us.

Tbh, I was a bit confused by Cryptics implementation of this on the Tribble Test Server. There are some limitations for the first week, so I'll wait until I can access my other characters and do a respec.

However, I took a look at the skills themselves and one thing is for sure. You gotta be exactly sure of what kinda of build you wanna have. Personally, I'm glad to see that users of Hangar Pets get some love as I counted three Skills specifically dealing with Hangar Pets as well as one Unlock choice in addition to that.

What I am really surprised at are the changes to the Ground Skills, which makes wonder their impact on the Commando Specialization.

I want some more information on how some of the new abilities will perform, like the electric damage when performing a drain attack, or reflecting damage when critically hit, etc.
Also I noticed that if you want to use the ultimate abilities you have to put more than half your skill points into one of the three trees. Makes me wonder if the number of skill points should be raised from 50.

There's no reason for it to require a grind at level 60. You earn skill points as you level up. Being at level 60 means you've already earned the points. It should be the same as the last time they did this kind of revamp, we'll need to reallocate our skill points.

I left due to the ever increasing complexity and ridiculously poor matching of the PVP. So decided to dust off it's spot on my hard drive before I deleted it... and here I am studying again. Sigh. I'll delete my main and alts and start over since obviously it's the sane thing to do as I've learned to do with other demanding complicated relationships. Maybe, hopefully, wonderfully I'll get more play and less work out of a less demanding relationship with Cryptic...giggle.